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JFAC hears health-and-welfare budget concerns; approves behavioral health and psychiatric supplemental appropriations
Summary
During a JFAC meeting, legislators and analysts discussed Medicaid trends, foster care, Meals on Wheels funding and caregiver pay. The committee approved multiple behavioral-health supplemental appropriations and language to allow limited intra-division transfers under Idaho Code 67-35-11.
Senator Julie VanOrden, a member of the Senate Welfare Committee, told the Joint Finance-Appropriations Committee that the Medicaid expansion population is growing faster than the regular Medicaid population, and that medical inflation is a driver of higher costs. She and members of her committee also highlighted foster-care spending, concerns about an ombudsman position budget, and questions about Meals on Wheels funding.
The committee heard related budget and supplemental requests from Legislative Services analysts and Department of Health and Welfare staff and approved several behavioral-health appropriations. Lawmakers voted to allow the Department of Health and Welfare to spend unused federal grants tied to the Idaho Behavioral Health Plan (IBHP) and to add one-time funds to civil-commitment and community-hospitalization costs at State Hospital programs.
Why it matters: The state is responding to rising behavioral-health expenditures tied to implementation grants and to higher costs for mental-hold and commitment services. Committee action authorizes the department to spend federal grants…
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